A STUDY INTO MONITORING AND EVALUATION ON PUBLIC PROJECTS: A CASE STUDY OF CENTRAL TONGU DISTRICT By Coffie Louis Kwame (Bsc. Quantity Survey and Construction Economics) A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Construction Technology and Management, College of Art and Built Environment in partial fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE IN PROJECT MANAGEMENT NOVEMBER, 2018. i DECLARATION I hereby declare that this submission is my own work towards the MSc. Project Management and that to the best of my knowledge, it contains no material previously published by another person nor material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree of the university or any other university, except where due acknowledgement has been made in the text. COFFIE LOUIS KWAME (PG1159317) ……………………. ………………….. Student Signature Date Certified by PROF. T. ADJEI-KUMI ……………………. ………………….. Supervisor Signature Date Certified by PROF. BERNARD K. BAIDEN ……………………. ………………….. Head of Department Signature Date ii DEDICATION This work is dedicated to all the people who inspired, supported and encouraged me. To my mother, Madam Philomena Edu, thank you for her love and support. To my Uncle, Nana Owusu Oware V, Kyedomhene of Buem Traditional Area, and Chief of Teteman and Siblings, for being such an encouragement during my research for the project work. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT My foremost gratitude goes to the Almighty God for the wisdom, mercy and protection that He bestowed on me. I express my unwavering gratitude to Dr. Theophilus Adjei- Kumi my supervisor, for the useful criticisms and suggestions. I will forever be grateful to him for his critique and the special attention he gave to the work which saw me though the thesis on time. Special acknowledgement also goes to Mr. Victor Karikari for his invaluable contribution to this dissertation during its write up. The financial support I received from my Mother, Madam Philomena Edu and my siblings Miss. Deborah Amoah and Miss. Boamah Priscilla cannot go without mention. Without their financing, my education would have been impossible and this thesis would subsequently have remained a dream. My sincere thanks go to the entire Management of Central Tongu District Assembly for their encouragement throughout my study and even at a time that I taught completing the study on time was not possible. Finally, I render my heartfelt gratitude to Bright Afetorgbor, Bonney Selorm Richard and Jennifer Lawson for their support and encouragement. Without their inspiration and motivation, the completion of the thesis would have been a challenge. What I can ask for is the blessing of the Almighty God for the contributors of this work. iv ABSTRACT The study aimed at examining the challenges associated with monitoring and evaluation of public funded projects using Central Tongu District as a case study. An extensive literature review was conducted which aided in the development of a structured questionnaire to be distributed to the respondents. Using the census survey sampling technique thirty-one (31) questionnaires were collected and subsequently analyzed using descriptive statistics and the Relative Importance Index (RII). The major finding for the first objective was that, the most often used monitoring technique was financial monitoring followed by physical monitoring. With the evaluation techniques, interim evaluation was ranked as the most often used followed by terminal evaluation and ex- post evaluation. The major findings of the objective two (2) were that, the highest ranked benefit was “they can serve as an assessment tool”. This was followed by “helps in the provision of progress report” and “assessing stakeholder performance”. The major findings of the objective three were that, the most severe challenge as indicated by the respondents was weak institutional capacity. This was followed by weak linkage between activities and limited resources and budgetary allocation for monitoring and evaluation. With these findings, it was recommended that, project managers should establish mechanisms for monitoring and evaluation for their organizations. Also, monitoring and evaluation should not be treated as a means of fulfilling requirements of project contract. However, it should be treated as a way of measuring achievements against objectives and taking corrective actions where necessary to enhance the probability of achieving project success. Keywords: Monitoring, evaluation, challenges, public funded projects. v TABLE OF CONTENT DECLARATION ............................................................................................................................... II DEDICATION................................................................................................................................... III ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ............................................................................................................ IV ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................................... V TABLE OF CONTENT ................................................................................................................. VI LIST OF TABLES ...........................................................................................................................IX CHAPTER ONE ................................................................................................................................ 1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Background of the Study ............................................................................................................. 1 1.2. Problem Statement ...................................................................................................................... 3 1.3 Research Questions ...................................................................................................................... 3 1.4 Aim .................................................................................................................................................. 4 1.5 Objectives of the Study ............................................................................................................... 4 1.6 Significance of Study ................................................................................................................... 4 1.7 Scope of Study .............................................................................................................................. 5 1.8. Research Methodology ............................................................................................................... 5 1.9 Organization of the Study ........................................................................................................... 5 CHAPTER TWO ............................................................................................................................... 7 LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................................... 7 2.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 7 2.2 Overview of the Construction Industry and Its ...................................................................... 7 performance .......................................................................................................................................... 7 2.3 Monitoring and Evaluation in Construction Projects .......................................................... 12 2.3.1 Techniques/Methods in Monitoring ..................................................................................... 14 2.3.1.1 Process Monitoring ............................................................................................................. 14 2.3.1.2 Impact Monitoring ............................................................................................................... 15 2.3.1.3 Physical And Financial Monitoring ................................................................................. 15 2.3.2 Techniques For Evaluation ................................................................................................... 15 2.4 benefits of monitoring and evaluation of construction ....................................................... 16 projects ................................................................................................................................................. 16 vi 2.5 Challenges in Monitoring and Evalauting Construction .................................................... 18 Projects ................................................................................................................................................ 18 2.5.1 Lack of Knowledge and Competency .................................................................................. 20 2.5.2 Weak Linkage between Activities ......................................................................................... 20 2.5.3 limited resources and budgetary allocation for monitoring and evaluation .............. 20 2.5.4 Weak institutional capacity...................................................................................... 21 2.5.5 Stakeholders lack of interest in Monitoring and Evaluation .......................................... 21 2.5.6